It may be desirable to have antennas aligned, not only for operation, but for increased communication efficiency. Present day alignment techniques may be relatively time consuming and involve picking visible landmarks somewhere between two end points or antennas. An educated guess or estimate is made on where the other end point would likely be relative to a given end point. Either or both antennas may be physically adjusted, for example, in azimuth and tilt, in an attempt to align the antennas. This may be particularly difficult as microwave links, for example, can have a length in the 40 mile range or greater, which is well beyond a human's visible sight range.
This present day guess and check method involves an increased amount of time for a technician to be on top of a tower moving the antenna back and forth in an attempt to find the other end point.
U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2016/0056525 to Hansryd et al. is directed to a radio antenna alignment tool. More particularly, Hansryd et al. discloses a sensor unit connected to a first directive antenna. The sensor unit determines a present direction of the first directive antenna. An interface on which sensor information that includes the present direction can be accessed. A guide device receives, on a first input port, the present direction of the first directive antenna from the interface of the sensor unit and indicates to a user at least one of the present direction of the first directive antenna, the location of the second antenna, and a preferred direction of the first directive antenna. The preferred direction of the first directive antenna is determined to maximize a signal quality metric for communication between the first directive antenna and at least one second antenna.